


The Burden of Hope

by AdorableDoom



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-20
Updated: 2016-01-20
Packaged: 2018-05-15 02:39:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5768185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AdorableDoom/pseuds/AdorableDoom
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hope carries her through.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Burden of Hope

**Author's Note:**

> Major spoilers for Star Wars: The Force Awakens
> 
> Based on a comment my Mom made after the first time we saw The Force Awakens about Leia naming her son after her only hope which broke my heart into even tinier pieces than it already was.

     "Obi-Wan Kenobi is our only hope," her father tells her. His voice never wavers though she knows he was afraid. It was the last she'd ever see him. He was a brave man, a good man. Although she had no way of truly knowing, she imagines he was brave in the end too.  
She carries these words with her, wears them like armor. Obi-Wan Kenobi is our only hope. She tells herself that as she places what was perhaps the Resistance's only hope of survival into a battered R2 unit. Obi-Wan Kenobi is our only hope. She tells herself that as the man who was once her father has her tortured.  
     She does not break. She does not yield. Her hope carries her through. It carries her as the world she knew as her home and all the people she had known and loved vanished in a terrible flash of light. It carries her through as the man who was once her father strikes down the man she'd pinned her hopes on.  
    She does not waver though her heart is breaking and more often than not she isn't sure how much she can take. Her hope carries her through the icy wasteland of Hoth and the darkest days of the rebellion. It carries her to Cloud City where she watches the man that she loves (because she loves him so much more than she'd ever thought possible) tortured and taken. It carries her through every battle, every betrayal, every wound, and loss. She clings to it like a lifeline because some nights it's all she has.  
     Her son, their son, is born four hours after the Galactic Concordance is signed. A new Republic, a democracy rises from the ruins of the Empire. She looks down at her son, her perfect little boy, as fireworks light up the sky and celebrations ignite across the galaxy. He will not grow up under the thumb of tyrant. He will grow up free and safe.  
He is hope, living and breathing hope. Her hope. "What should we call him?" Han asked, breaking the spell at last. Leia doesn't hesitate.  
   "Ben."  
    What other name is there for hope?  
    As he grows, even as she sees the darkness in him, the same darkness that consumed her father and destroyed her family, Leia still clings to that hope. Luke can save him. She and Han can save their son. There is good in him, so much good that it's nearly overwhelming. She can feel it, struggling against the poison that is Snoke. They will not get her son.  
    They cannot have him.  
    They cannot have her son. If she has to drag him back into the light with her bare hands she will. Leia will not loose him. She will not loose hope. She tells herself that, over and over again, even as she sinks onto the nearest surface, feeling as if it were her own heart that had been run through.


End file.
